More than 60 miles of streets in Toledo targeted for 2013 work

The city of Toledo will repave or rebuild more than 60 miles of roadways in 2013.

The Bell administration on Wednesday released the list of major thoroughfares and residential streets slated for repair and reconstruction for next year.

Major streets targeted in the roadway program include the delayed reconstruction of Secor Road between Central Avenue and Monroe Street, as well as a one-mile stretch of Collingwood Boulevard in the Old West End.

Both projects had been among the projects scheduled for 2012 but were postponed. Both will be paid with funds from this year’s capital improvement budget and federal grants.

The total costs for the projects will be about $44.5 million. Of that, about $15,778,000 is carry-over for projects budgeted in 2012, leaving $28,708,720 that will be taken from the 2013 budget — a combination of capital improvement project funds and state and federal matching grants.

The proposal from Mayor Mike Bell is a dramatic increase in street repair for 2012, when the city used $14.9 million from the city’s capital improvement program.

Other large road projects that will be undertaken include resurfacing nearly 10 miles of Hill Avenue and repairing East Broadway in East Toledo between Woodville Road and 6th Street.

Also West Bancroft Street will be rebuilt from Reynolds Road west to the city limits and Suder Avenue between Shoreland Avenue and Alexis Road.

Jen Sorgenfrei, a spokesman for the city, said the preliminary project list was distributed to city councilmen to get their input on the plans before the administration submits the four-year capital improvement project budget next week to council.

She said that because of budget limitations the administration is asking council members to refrain from adding residential streets to the project list, and if they feel a street deserves repair, they should substitute it for one that is on the proposal.

Councilman D. Michael Collins said the much of the work in the proposal will require the city to borrow money against future revenues to pay for the improvements.

“We are doing this with borrowed money, which obviously has to be repaid with interest,” he said. “However, there is almost no alternative at this time.”

Mr. Collins said the street repair program has suffered because of financial difficulties several years ago.

“Realistically, in the first two years of the Bell administration, the capital improvement budget was used almost exclusively as a rainy-day fund. We are paying the price now because of the additional neglect that our streets received,” he said.

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